The real reason BS will save the world, as any practitioner of it knows, is by dissipating the bands of solidity which hold our most oppressive agreements in place about reality, thus enablilng change, growth, the re-generation of order and new visions of possibility. In the absence of BS, old realities get more complex and solid as they accumulate the encrustations of falisifying Time and the cumulative focussed ignoral of Reality Junkies, the sub-hypnotic subscribers to anything asserted loudly.

Such a heap will continue to grow and a thousand flowers will blossom, their roots deep into the rich, nutrious, soil; their perfume wafting on the inconstant zephyrs, tickling the noses of those fortunate enough to enjoy the teasing scents thus born. And they will bring forth another thousand flowers, nay, ten thousand more, and these a hundred thousand, and soon the entire Earth will be be covered with offspring of those first few flowers, and the newly fertilized Earth will become a sea of blooms and the air a pleasure dome of scent, and all creatures will exist in harmony and peace with one another. And they will look back and say, "Blessed be MAOB, from which all Good has sprung."

Man, BWL, that is an amazing thought; but I've seen skyscrapers being built in Honk Kong where all the lifting framework was made of bamboo frames tied together in stages going up thirty stories. So I believe your tale, hard though it may seem.

Okay, they weren't really welding with pigshit. The pigshit was in an oxcart which was covered by a big plastic bag. The methane from the pigshit inflated the bag and was pressurized so it would flow through the welding hoses by simply putting a brick or two on top of the bag, causing it to slowly collapse. Probably wouldn't get hot enough to weld stainless steel, but it'd probably do brazing and cutting just fine.

It has been tough, with many tries and slogging my way through the muck of cyberspace to reach the MOAB this evening. Mom seems to be playing hard to get all of a sudden. I hope the thread hasn't reached a critical mass. I'd hate to think I was sending the last ever post to dear ol' Mom!

If we could capture the energy expended n deluging the American people with BS by advertisers, politicans and religonists, we could power the nation without any gasoline or oil at all; and it is obviously a renewable resource!!

The solution to all of the world's energy problems will sooner or later boil down to capturing methane from pit toilets and composting everything else. I'll collect my millions billions for this idea as soon as I figure out how to patent it. There's so much other shit out there in the marketplace already I know it can be done.

Amos, if you are suggesting that I pack my flashight or other battery-powered stuff with cow poop I'm gonna make a suggestion for you. A similar one, I admit, but that which is to be packed is different.

As to BS, while we have always suspected it might in some way save the planet, this intuitive suspicion has now been validated by no less an entity than Science itself:

"

It's electric: Cows show promise as powerplants

August 31, 2005

A new study suggests that some of the microorganisms found in cow waste may provide a reliable source of electricity.

Results showed that the microbes in about a half a liter of rumen fluid – fermented, liquefied feed extracted from the rumen, the largest chamber of a cow's stomach – produced about 600 millivolts of electricity. That's about half the voltage needed to run one rechargeable AA-sized battery, said Ann Christy, a study co-author and an associate professor of food, agricultural and biological engineering at Ohio State University.

While rumen fluid itself won't be used as an energy source, some of the microorganisms found in the fluid are also found in cow dung, which may prove to be a good source for generating electricity. In fact, in a related experiment, the researchers used cow manure directly to create energy for a fuel cell.

Using cow dung as an energy source isn't a new idea – some farmers already use the methane released by livestock waste to power machinery and lights. But converting methane into electricity requires costly equipment – one California farmer reportedly spent $280,000 to convert his operation to a methane digester system.

"Methane still needs to undergo combustion, which creates issues with energy efficiency," said Hamid Rismani-Yazdi, the study's lead author and a graduate student in food, agricultural and biological engineering at Ohio State.

The research showed how electricity can be created as the microorganisms in rumen fluid break down cellulose – a complex carbohydrate that is the primary component of the roughage that cows eat. That breakdown releases electrons. " This gives new dimension to the Eveready menagerie, which will soon be taken over by mad cows.

Time to sit quietly and knit another snood, I think. Keep my head low. Sometimes, you know you should bite your tongue, but you hit "submit" anyway. People who want to knit pick should have the sense to go dig out their own "facts," not insist that the person they're calling wrong go do it. Prove their own goddamned points for themselves. . . .

Time for a glass of wine. And I need to put in another load of laundry, clean the cat box, and go shave my legs. Cool off before I wade back in. Or not.

And they had not one, but TWO diffent types of cannon barrels there. I could have built my own 12 pounder or a three pounder, but would Pat let me buy even ONE cannon barrel? Nooooooooooooo. Would she let me buy a tiny little 1 inch swivel gun that had a nice spike you could stick into a stump or a post of your stockade? Nooooooooooooooo.

I even promised not to load it with ball or canister unless I got really, really annoyed with the neighbors, too.

Personally, I'd rather touriods weren't invited. I went to the Portneuf Muzzleloaders Rondy earlier this year in the hills near Arimo (15 miles away, maybe). Lots nicer, and hardly anyone there except fellow members of the club. Very little public attendance, even if they would let you shoot a cannon.

I never could see the attraction of one of those over-attended events. As a park ranger I learned quickly to dread such gatherings and would head the opposite direction if I could get out of working at it.

Ft. Bridger, Wyoming??? It sits in middle of the town of Ft. Bridger, Wyoming. Normally there are flushables, but for this event they used the Standard Portable Hooter (SPH).

I am not exaggerating when I estimate 15 - 20 thousand folks there over the three days of the Rondy. Highlanders in kilts and armed with basket-hilted swords and pipes, mountain men (and women) wearing leather clothes (and the temp in the upper 80s!) and some in furs and wools, white folks re-enacting Indians, Indians (Blackfeet, Sioux, Shoshone, Ute, Paiute and others) dancing (and laughing, I suspect, at the white men pretending to be Indians), 18th Century breeches and a stockings, 19th century silk dresses and parasols, a couple of pre-1860 cowboys (!), kids, dogs, tipis, wedge tents, baker tents, wall tents, miner tents, flintlocks, caplocks, cannons, swords, knives, tomahawks.... And a good time was had by pretty much everyone.

Oh, yeah. Tourists. Touroids spending money and asking things like "Do you always dress like this?" and "Are you Robin Hood?" and "Do you take American Money?" (yes, and they also take Mastercard and Visa, usually). Motorcyclists -- lots and lots of them, as expected.

Once again, I refrained from pointing at someone walking around with a (flintlock) pistol in his or her belt and carrying a (flintlock) rifle and screaming "Jesus Christ! He's got a gun!" I would find it amusing, but Pat has threatened several forms of mayhem if I did it.

And, oh yeah, cops. Cops on horses, cops on ATVs, cops walking around. Modern cops, with .40 caliber semiauto handguns and mace and radios. There's A LOT of money going through one of this things...and there's always the druggies and thieves and drunks. (Ask yourself whether or not, if you were, say, a thief, you'd try to rob a dude who's carrying a tomahawk, knife, and possibly a rifle with an 18 inch bayonet -- but the cops are always around and it's a good thing, too!) So are the EMTs....

This was the first large-scale Western Rondy I've been too. Stacks up well with Hunters' Moon and Friendship.

Yes, Pat was asked what she did to her hand. Usually the person asking first looked to see if I had any damage and then asked the question. Unlike myself, Pat gave a straight answer: she made a 5-point landing on concrete. And she'd admit that I had nothing to do with it and that there was a witness to prove it.

That being said, I have returned. Poorer, yes -- we began replacing the books on reenactment which we lost in the mail (1.5 boxes out of 63 -- not too bad). Things like the Books of Buckskinning 1 - 7. There weren't any at the Ft. Bridger Rondy, books of buckskinning I mean, but we were able to buy about USD 70.00 worth, and it's a start.

Musically it was pretty good, too. I felt sorry for one singer, up there in the gazebo, playing his guitar and singing to no audience at all because it was rainning.

I didn't do any shooting and we didn't even take out reenactment clothes with us (but these pictures might give you an idea; Jill is a friend and Quilt Guild mate of Pat's). I did buy a new hat; I wore my old one in the rain and it shrank so that it only covers the point of my head.

I trust Mom behaved herself in my absence and didn't sneak off to The Cock and Balls muzzleloaders' bar for a few libations, etc.?

I just checked Google and it was one of my posts - very strange. I myself mentioned the flush of a distant toilet a number of times, and I was not the first person to mention the flush of a distant toilet.

"The flush of a distant toilet" was a phrase coined by Ebbie on this thread Advice Sought -How to Hijack a Thread , which was started by none other than your own Khing Khandu (posts are out of order of course). It contains some of the finest BS outside of the MOAB, including many fine examples of poetry about the flush of a distant toilet, the distant sounds of toilets flushing, the flushing sound of distant toilets, and distant sounds of toilets flushing - distantly.

Gems such as this:

I dropped the pasta in the pan All meaning for to boil it But I was interrupted by The flush of a distant toilet.

By the way, after all the many times "flush of a distant toilet" has been used recently on the Mudcat it only yields one* hit on Google. We must do something about that! All are urged to post the phrase to as many other Web forums as possible.

* Actually three hits, but they're all the same Mudcat post, just on different servers.

In my post of 10:30 AM, Sept. 5, I used the term "above-mentioned". Well, since just about everybody doubtlessly accesses the MOAB in descending order, should that be "below-mentioned"? Or should we not make any assumptions and call it "above-mentioned for those viewing in ascending order/below-mentioned for those viewing in descending order" thus covering any and all eventualities and providing a modicum of protection from those who would pick nits? Or should we content ourselves with worrying about hunger, genocide, imperialism, xenophobia and the price of widgets and let the "above or below" thing slide?

That said, however, it is immensely satisfying to see the beneficial results off a lot of work, dispelling Ugliness and Imposing Beauty ... well, at least, order. An excellent birthday present for the BBW.

I beg your pardon, Maggie, but there is no evidence that the above-mentioned unspoken rule has been spoken. It has been conceived, typed, uploaded, downloaded and read, but it remains unspoken until someone actually says it out loud. As far as we know Amos has not actually spoken the words, just typed them.

My bones are aching and my knuckles are lined with caulk and touch-up paint. It is mazing, is it not, how fixing one thing in a mess suddenly brings a hundred lesser evils into plain sight,t hat had not been seen before? Order seems to unleash confusion from its sleep.

For the sake of a pun, many rules are bent. For the sake of our musical collection, we haven't bent so far as to purchase any recordings of Mr. G playing any instrument.

It is an interesting exercise to consider what he might do with other wind instruments. Bagpipes, for example. Do you think he'd be trampled to death before finishing his first practice session, or when he tried to begin the second?

It has been revealed on another Web forum (which shall remain anonymous, of course) that MOAB founder "khandu" is, in fact, a well known though notoriously insipid pop music icon. CLICK!

Now we understand why though everyone knows that "khandu"'s real name is "Kenny", nobody knows his last name. It's because he doesn't have one! It's just a single letter, not a real name!

It also explains "khandu"'s periodic lengthy absences from the Mudcat. No, they're not due to having an away-from-home job or even due to periodic hospitalizations for "nervous disorders". They're just due to his being on tour in countries such as Botswana where Internet service is less reliable than in Mississippi. Musical icons on their downslides have to go wherever people still think they're cool, ya know. Carnegie Hall today, a mosquito-ridden dump in Belize tomorrow.